[PB78] Dreylin boldly goes

[Dreylin]

T205 -

Everyone is at Peace. It makes sense I guess since no-one is ready to take Magic Island, but it has tied down forces in both enclosed cities. Superdeath especially has trapped a large force behind an actual Peace Treaty, while Donovan and I have Cease Fire only.

Superdeath is heading for Constitution - I imagine a revolt to Rep/Merc is imminent - while Donovan has completed Astronomy and I imagine will be grabbing Chemistry next. Rifling finishes EoT, and most cities are ready to start Rifles next turn.

Donovan showed up wanting a NAP to t230; I sent back Fish-Fish without the deadline.

[Dreylin]

T206 -

[Dreylin]

T208 -

I was going to report this turn earlier, but it got a bit lost in PB81...

Anyway, last turn Superdeath finished Constitution and underwent a non-GA revolt to Rep & Merc. This will be huge for his economy with 30 cities, but I'm also 90% sure that it's 2 turns of Anarchy (I dug out T-Hawk's civfanatics thread), which means I am a lock for Liberalism. Even just for demial purposes, that is pretty important, but there's an outside chance that this will give me enough time to Liberate Steam Power - a huge boost. So I went ahead and spent my "disappointing" Great Scientist to finish Education, I'll grab Philosophy this turn and should have enough reserves & overflow to get Liberalims in 2 more turns. I don't /think/ I can 1t it, but even at 2t, that makes me a lock for the tech.

Now to grab for Steam Power would need me to also complete Chemistry, which is ~3t tech at current configuration. I doubt that Superdeath would give me that much extra time by not competing, but we'll see. I will also take a look next turn at just how much I can squeeze out with Research builds and Specialists, etc.

[Dreylin]

T209 -

Challenge Accepted:



This is with minimal starvation; I actually went back and added a few more beakers just to be sure some hiccough didn't cost me the fraction of a beaker needed to complete Chemistry.

Since he has yet to complete Paper, the only scenario where Superdeath can beat me to Liberalism is if he has 2 Great Scientists and is willing to spend them both to pop Education next turn. Donovan does not have Rep or Caste, nor any appreciable savings, so I do not believe he can beat me either.

Demos are twisted out of normal, but Superdeath's GNP here is kinda scary if it's his new normal.

[Dreylin]

T211 - Challenge achieved.





I was late to Sistine, so not a huge surprise I missed it, but still disappointing - I'll have to pit-stop at Drama and get some border pushback going.

Hmmm, Chapel's Great Merchant poses an interesting question - how much attention are the others paying to research? Superdeath did power through Education last turn, so I absolutely needed to twist the entire empire to achieve Steam Power but if he isn't paying attention, maybe it looks like I grabbed Economics for the Merchant. I'm not 100% sure, but there's also a decent chance he can't see my research - though a deeper check of F4 would of course reveal it. I don't want to afford to continue to twist the economy for the coinflip, so instead what I'll do is put a bit over 500b into Economics this turn, then if it's still open I can bulb it to completion with the current Merchant for denial purposes. Either way my next target is Steel, and then I decide whether to push directly to Assembly Line to Industrialise, or to grab Railroad first (probably the latter, maybe?).

Coal is under our Capitals, so that's an incremental boost for Kirk. There are a few elsewhere on the map; the one flagged at Riker is on the hill onshore from Khaaaaaaan and there's another in Donovan's land North of Dr. Crusher. As far as Levee's are concerned, Kirk is really the only city where it makes immediate sense - I'll take a few shots of my tiddly rivers next turn. Scott can probably justify one, but that city wants Oxford ASAP and the Levee won't payback before the straight Uni-Oxford build.

Also, 50% increase in Worker productivity is already throwing me off!

[Dreylin]

T212 - A collection of tiny rivers

Superdeath grabbed the Merchant as expected and has turned towards Printing Press. I'll save on Drama and then grab Steel. Civics are available and I am tempted by Free Market; Kirk is getting 41c from Bureau but I have 26 Towns - not all of that will go through a higher multiplier, but still enough to outweigh once the reduced cost of the civic is factored. The Culture bonus will be most welcome, however right now I want the hammers in Kirk:



I need the Uni to complete in 9t to tie up with the others for Oxford, so I'll time the switch based on that.


As for other Levees:



Since I'm putting Ironworks here it will probably be worthwhile, but with IW build available in 3-4turns, I think I'll put the Levee in afterwards.




Here the Levee would delay the Oxford build, so I'm skipping in for the immediate impact.






Nope, and Nope!




Probably worthwhile here eventually, but it's got growth & other stuff to do first.

Troi (visible to the North in the last shot) is really the only "just off the river" spot, but that's a border city on a hill so I think justified.